XVI International Botanical Congess
The genus Lycoris is endemic to Sino-Japanese flora and most of the species are distributed in the laurel-leaved forest zone ranging from eastern Himalaya to central Japan skirting southern Korea.The genus consists of about 30 taxa, and the majority cannot propagate by seeds. These taxa reproduce vegetatively by bulbs. From the cytological and morphological point of view, these sterile taxa are certainly produced spontaneously by hybridization among the fertile stem taxa. In Japan, 4 sterile taxa, L.albiflora (2n=17), L.rubroaurantiaca (2n=17), L.squamigera (2n=27) and L.radiata (2n=33) were studied. In Korea, L.flavescens (2n=19) and L.chejuensis (2n=30) were examined. In Chinese flora, many sterile taxa not yet described formally were found and examined.